Transcript CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 6
EARLY AMERICAN FUNERAL
UNDERTAKING
The Birth of American
Funeral Directing
• Funeral Directing as an occupation was
born in America during the 19th century.
• Tradesman Undertakers:
– From 1685 we remember undertaking has
been an occupation involving:
• Furnishing of the paraphernalia of morning.
• Conducting funerals following other feudal
societies.
• Few persons dedicated solely to the trade.
Limitations of the term
“funeral directing”
• Provisions of a set of tasks for the
care and disposal of the dead.
• A personal service which operates
as a business enterprises.
The Birth of American
Funeral Directing
• Now as we move to the Settlers of the
Plains:
– Social and class distinctions were not likely
to be introduced (there was no social status).
– The Colonies worked against transplanting
the “Dismal Trader” of England to the
Americas.
The Tradesman Undertaker
• Introduction of many craftsman into
the field of undertaking.
• Importance increased as cities grew
and material resources of the
townspeople increased.
The Birth of American
Funeral Directing
• Remember again from last time
“undertakers” were not called
undertakers except as underwriters of
commercial business ventures.
• The first person in the middle of the 18th
century that advertised as an
“undertaker,” that we now know
surprisingly enough was…..
You guessed it…….A woman!!!!!
The Birth Of American Funeral
Directing
• Blanche White~
– Advertised in the New Your Journal of
General Advertisers on January 7, 1768
• “Blanche White, Upholsterer and Undertaker,
from London, on the New-Dock, next door but
one to Alderman Livingston’s; Makes all kinds
of Upholstery Work, in the newest Fashions and
on the most reasonable Terms; Likewise all
kinds of Field Equipage, Drums, Etc. Funerals
furnishe’d with all things necessary and proper
Attendance as in England.”
The Birth of American
Funeral Directing
• English influence had made it to Canada
as well~
– In 1820 a Montreal directory of Merchant,
Traders and Housekeepers listed:
• Mrs. Benjamin Birch, Funeral Undertaker,
20 Campeau Str. Forster & Fry
Upholsters & Undertakers, Cabinet
Makers, Furniture Show Rooms.
• Mrs. Birch was also listed as a
shoemaker at the same address.
• In the Colonial period, Cabinet-making
was often found with Upholstering, and
undertaking was usually added to the
business.
• It was more often that the Cabinetmakers, chair makers, etc., were only
suppliers of coffins.
• Over time their functions moved from
providing material goods (coffins, etc.)
to including and providing non-material
personal services.
• They were few in the early years, but
with no clear cut or uniform church or
state regulation over funerals, they were
provided opportunity for development
of these skills as added specialties to the
current occupation…
• Remember the spirit of industry…
– Everyone was creating professions.
Coffin & Cabinet Making
• Michael Jenkins– A well known furniture maker in Baltimore.
• He was one of the first to combine
“coffin making” with cabinet making.
• He was later appointed coroner in 1799
and then became an undertaker.
• Shortly after he extended his activities to
include “undertaking”.
Coffin & Cabinet Making
• Jacob Knorr– A German Quaker set up a 2 story joiner’s
shop in Germantown, PA.
– In addition to his lumber yard he advertised
that he made “coffins on demand.”
– Died in 1804
• Children sold the business
• Passed down from generation to generation
• The coffin-shop-turned-undertaking-turnedfuneral directing establishment has existed now
for over 194 years.
There are very few business with such long
pedigrees
Coffin & Cabinet Making
• Your book goes to great lengths to list
firms that make this point, but in no way
does it exhaust the list of early cabinetmaking and furniture business firms that
began undertaking early in the 19th
century.
• They have been included specifically to
illustrate the fact of persistence of
operation.
• Nearly all of them are still in business
today under the name of the original
founder.
Coffin & Cabinet Making
• Thomas Chartres– Advertised in 1829 that besides selling
cabinet furniture and making cabinets,
“Funerals attended on the shortest notice,
and Hacks and Hearse provided.
– Andrew Oaks– Advertised in a Brooklyn City Directory
not only the practice of the various crafts,
but….
lost children might safely be left with him
until the parents could be found!?!?!?!
Coffin & Cabinet Making
• The occupational advances made by
Sherman Blair show a pattern:
– 1840-Sherman Blair, Cabinet Maker
– 1841-Sherman Blair, Cabinet manufacturer
– 1846-Sherman & R. Blair, Cabinet
manufacturer and undertakers.
– 1853-Blair’s Cabinet Furniture, Upholsters
and undertakers.
The Furnishings Undertaker
• Another tradesman-undertaker.
• Offered services on occasion at funerals.
• He provided other undertakers with
necessary supplies and paraphernalia.
• His appearance tool place concurrently
with the small combination operator.
(cabinet maker, carpenter, sexton &
liveryman who only did funerals as a
sideline).
The Furnishings Undertaker
• The small combination operator was not
likely to have all the necessary supplies
and paraphernalia on hand.
• Where do you think we get our supplies
today?
The Furnishings Undertaker
• Suppliers
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Product mix
Service
Technical support
Product effectiveness
Pricing
Incentives
The Furnishings Undertaker
• The Furnishing Undertaker served to
encourage more people to enter the
field…..Why do you think this happened?
• Newcomers to the industry would not
have to lay initial capital for the
merchandise and equipment required to
start the business.
The Furnishings Undertaker
• Not only was the field opened wider to
new practitioners, but
personal service, unhampered by
obligations to craft or trade could
become a central preoccupation of the
Undertaker.
• What value does personal service have
with the Modern Funeral Directors?
The Furnishing Undertaker
• Personal service became important
during the colonial period.
• Because of increasing distances to the
graveside, rental of carriages and buggies
became more common.
• Foot processions became very rare.
• By the first quarter of the 19th century,
the use of carriages and horse drawn
hearses began to spread.
The Furnishing Undertaker
• Horse drawn hearses…
The Furnishing Undertaker
• Following several decades certain phases
in the advertisements became
standardized, especially “will attend
personally and take proper measure that
a decent order be preserved. Pg. 236
Something to think about:
The Furnishing Undertaker
GARDNER T. SWARTZ
Livery Stable Keeper, Undertaker
Tomb Proprietor and Dealer in ready-made
coffins, of all kinds and at all
prices, near the corner of
Pine and Dorrance – Street
Providence
The Furnishing Undertaker
Z. Cotton & Sons
• Now, if Andrew Oakes could take care of
lost children as well as dead bodies, so
could Z. Cotton “undertake,” pull teeth,
and frame pictures. Pg. 146
Earlier Performers of
Personal Service
• 1. Friends and neighbors were the first to
come to the aid of the bereaved.
• 2. Nurses and mid-wives.
– Nurses and midwives practiced healing arts
outside of particular families and cared for
the sick in the small communities and in the
case of death they extended their personal
service to include “laying out of the dead.”
Earlier Performers of
Personal Service
• 3. By the end of the 18th century the
“Layers our of the Dead” was a specific
category of advertising.
• Although the mid-wife often shared with
the nurse many of the tasks involved in
burials, by the end of the 18th century,
laying out of the dead in larger cities had
become a specialty in its own right.
Pg. 147 figure 5 & 6
Earlier Performers of
Personal Service
• Despite their early appearance in the
emerging occupation of undertaking,
women became less conspicuous in such
endeavors as the 19th century got well
underway
Why do you think women started to become
less likely to go into the profession?
Do you think they have a foothold in the
industry today?
Religious Functionaries
Role of the Church Sexton
• Churchyard and church cemetery burial,
though not universal, continued until the
19th century to be the major mode of
sepulture in America as well as England.
• Like wise the church caretaker, or sexton
has always been associated with
churchyard burial and the care of the
cemetery.
Religious Functionaries
Role of the Church Sexton
• At the beginning of the 19th century to
the conventional “tolling of the bell” and
“digging of the grave” and such new
undertaking tasks as laying out the body,
being “in attendance,” directing the
procession, and, later, furnishing
undertakers with merchandise and
paraphernalia of funerals were taken over
by the sextons.
Religious Functionaries
Role of the Church Sexton
• Samuel Winslow–
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Was first listed as a housewright 1796.
Listed as housewright and sexton in 1807.
Listed as sexton in 1818.
Listed as sexton and undertaker in 1834.
In 1843 still as an undertaker, although the
general registry indicates he had not given
up sexton’s work altogether.
Religious Functionaries
Role of the Church Sexton
• Reverend Stephen Merritt– Began his undertaking in 1846.
– He was also a cartman, assistant captain of
the watch, lighter of the oil lamps, assistant
foreman of Mazsppa Engine Co., an
assessor, and spent his evenings at the
Episcopal Methodist Church as sexton.
Undertaking was still found as a sideline or
specialty along with many other tasks.
Why would they need to do so many
other things?
Religious Functionaries
Role of the Church Sexton
• The sextons also controlled the permits
to the cemetery.
• This monopoly on burial to bury in
churchyards and church cemeteries had
its advantages, this is why there was such
a rapid expansion in their numbers in the
first half of the 19th Century.
Municipal Officers Role
• They invited people to funerals.
• The town undertaker was often a
municipal officer.
• Often the town undertaker would be the
town health official or the city registrar
which was the person who approved
funeral charges.
– Hollis Chaffin in Rhode Island was one of
the town’s official undertakers and
surprisingly ran the old peoples’ asylum
(nursing home), and kept the city pound.
Municipal Officers Role
• By the nature of his work the undertaker
traditionally has been expected to have
the technical skills and knowledge
qualifying him for the role of coroner.
• This specialty has remained in close
affinity to the undertakers work for more
than a century.
What is the difference between the coroner
and Medical Examiner?
Undertaking Review
• 1. The Woodworker– In earliest colonial times made a coffin upon
demand, as society and economic
opportunity expanded about him, he found
that it made economic sense to turn part of
his shop into a warehouse of coffin
warehouse.
Undertaking Review
• 2. The Sexton– Found that in addition to tolling the bell and
digging or supervising the digging of the
grave, he could direct the funeral
arrangements and provide materials and
equipment which were more and more in
general demand.
Undertaking Review
• 3. The Proprietor of Hacks & Coaches– Found that funerals, in a land were distance
was no object, often involved rather
extended journeys and the order of the
funeral procession could not simply be left
to chance or individual discretion. Thus it
was a short step from furnishing a hearse or
coach for funeral use to the furnishing of
other funeral paraphernalia and to assuming
a processional directing function
Undertaking Review
• 4. The Midwife & Nurses– Found that extending her function to include
placing the body in a coffin, conducting the
funeral ceremonies, organizing the
procession and leading the rites found little
justification in a male-dominated society.
– There was only small precedent for female
services or trade functions, although female
undertakers were no novelty in England.
Specific undertaking
procedures before 1859
• Undertaking had taken on characteristics
of a service occupation with a set of tasks
and functions organized into a pattern of
behavior toward the dead that basically
included:
• 1. Laying out the body
• 2. Casket or Coffining the body
• 3. Transport the body to the grave
Specific undertaking
procedures before 1859
• The role of the clergy was important as
well.
• 1. Supplied the funeral sacred ritual.
• 2. Gave spiritual comfort to bereaved.
Specific undertaking
procedures before 1859
• The 1st half of the 19th Century is
therefore crucially important in the
evolution of the modern funeral director,
because this period witnessed all the
basic undertaking functions being
gathered and organized under a
conventionally recognized name, the
“Funeral Undertaker,” or more
commonly , the “Undertaker.”
Something else to think about: